September 30, 2009

This is the week of our state fair, but it doesn't look like my family and I are going to get there this year. We go every year and sometimes two or three times and we always have such a great time, but the weather this week has been cold and rainy. It's too cold for the baby and my son is too big for a stroller this year and it might be too much walking for him. We really don’t have the money to spend this time and my husband’s job isn’t looking very good right now, so I guess we'll skip it this year.

My card today is for the sketch challenge. I used an older SU stamp set from 1999, called Holiday Helpers. I stamped the images, colored them using my SU markers, and then cut them out.

I couldn't find any dp that had red and brown in it, so I decided to make my own. I took the Merry Christmas stamp from SU's Greetings 4 You stamp set and I stamped it repeatedly (along an angle) using Close to Cocoa and Real Red ink.

I'm not quite sure that I like the way my card turned out. I'm thinking I have a bit too much brown for a Christmas card. I added a wider red ribbon to help off set the brown. Maybe I should have layered this on a white card base, I might have to try this again.

Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful day!

September 29, 2009

Today's is my son's turn to take snack into preschool and he's so excited. I took him to the store yesterday and I let him pick out anything that he wanted. He picked out chocolate pudding and pretzels, so I hope they like his snack. I think my son is more excited about being the leader for the day rather than hosting snack for the day. He's at such a cute age, the littlest things excite him.

This is my card for today's color challenge. What a great color combination we have this week: Pretty in Pink, Sage Shadow, and Going Grey.

I really love these colors together, but I'm not too sure about my card. I'm still deciding if I like it and I've been working on it for a few hours now. I keep trying different things with my card, but I can't figure out what else to try.

I made my card by coloring the flower stamp using my SU markers and my background paper was stamped using pretty in pink and going grey ink. I added some white and grey dots to the pink card stock. The butterflies were punched out using the MS 3 in 1 butterfly punch and then I added a drop of liquid pearls to the centers of them.

The thinking of you sentiment is from SU's Warmest Regards and my ribbon is from Offray. I couldn’t figure out how to add ribbon to my card, so I just ended up using some ribbon tabs along the right side.

Have a wonderful day and thanks for looking!

September 28, 2009

Happy Monday to you all! It's going to be another busy week for me with preschool starting, but we are all still adjusting to our new schedule and I'm sure once we have our routine in place getting ready for school will go smoother.

This is my card for yesterday's featured stamper challenge. The featured stamper was NancyRuth. Here's her card that I decided to case. I kept the same colors and I used the same stamp set, but I changed the layout and I added a few more layers following last week's sketch challenge.

I also made this card for last Friday's limited supply challenge- to make a SOS card. S- stands for the SU stamps that I used. The O stands for the 'one sheet wonder' dp that I made. And the last S stands for the satin ribbon that I used.

I used SU's Happy Harmony stamp set to create my card. I cut my dp using the osw paper that I made and it's layered using Almost Amethyst and Lovely Lilac card stock.

The punched out butterflies are from Martha Stewart's 3 in 1 butterfly punch and my ribbon is from Offray. Thanks so much for stopping by and have a great day!

September 27, 2009

Here's my card for today's Clean & Simple challenge. Today's challenge is a color challenge. The colors for the challenge are: pink, blue, green, chocolate (optional), and white or cream. I have to say this certainly was a challenge for me. I found that using four different colors was hard for me to keep it cas, but I guess that's why they are called challenges, right? LOL

My card was super easy to make. I just colored my stamp using my SU markers and then I stamped the image on my card stock.

I stamped it once along the bottom of my card stock and then I turned the paper around and I stamped it again. I had to use my stamp-a-ma-jig to be sure that I got my image lined up the way that I wanted it. I also added a few small dots to the center of the flowers using the fine time of my chocolate chip marker.

I used my scor-pal to create the decorative scoring you see above my stamped image. I decided not to add a sentiment at this time, because I thought I could add one later when I needed. This way I could make this a birthday card, thinking of you card, etc.

This flower stamp is from SU's Garden Silhouettes stamp set. This set is one of my favorite stamp sets, I find myself using this stamp quite often! My ribbon is from Offray.

Thanks so much for looking! I hope you all had a great weekend.

September 24, 2009

Boy, it sure was a hot one here today! And just when my husband took out all of the air conditioners! I'm hoping today is the last of our hot days. In the morning it was cool and breezy, but later in the day it got pretty hot outside. I felt bad for my son who I dressed in jeans and a tee shirt for preschool. When I picked him up from school he was so hot and all he wanted was a drink. I'll have to be more careful of the weather and dress him accordingly.

I'm sort of glad that the hot weather will soon be over for us here. I am so afraid of bees that it's not even funny, but this little guy doesn't bother me. He's a free digi image from Dustin Pike and I love the way my card turned out. I made my card using Monday's CAS challenge sketch.

After I printed out this image, I colored it using my SU markers. I added some dots in the upper and lower right hand corners. And then I added two bits of ribbon on the upper left side of my main image panel. It might be hard to see in the picture, but after I colored the umbrella pink, I added some black dots using my SU black marker and some white dots using my white gel pen.

My sentiment is from SU's Warmest Regards. Thanks so much for looking!

September 23, 2009

This is the card that I made for yesterday's color challenge. The colors for today's challenge were: Elegant Eggplant, Summer Sun, and Black. Well, these were the alternate colors, usually there are in colors in the challenges, but I don't purchase the in color items.

Again, I decided to make another card using this week's CAS sketch challenge. The daisy image is from SU's Upsy Daisy stamp set.

I think I made a mistake with the butterflies I added. I'm not quite sure that I like them with the dots and silver pearl in the centers of them. I think next time I'll just leave them plain.

Originally in the upper right hand corner I did some paper piercing, but I made a mistake while piercing the paper and I had to try and come up with a way to hide my mistake. I ended up using my word window punch to punch the eggplant card stock. Then I added a silver brad and adhered them both to my card. I sort of like the corner treatment and my mistake here worked out for the better.

Thanks so much for looking, and have a wonderful day!

September 22, 2009

Well, I hope you all had a great day today! I'm just starting to feel better again. This cold really has me down these past few days, but I did find some time to make a few more cards for today's Clean & Simple challenge.

Today's challenge was a sketch challenge and I think it's such a quick and easy sketch that I just had to make a few more.

My first card I made using an image that I received in a Christmas image swap. I'm not sure who the image is made by, but it sure is cute and I certainly would buy this stamp if I found it.

Basically all I did was to color the image, add a few bling gems on the snowflakes, and assemble my card using SU decorative paper, ribbon, and silver brads. I colored my image using SU markers and the ice was water colored. My sentiment is from SU's Warmest Regards.


This is another card that I made using an image that I received in the same Christmas image swap. The polar bear image is from SU's Polar Express stamp set. Again, all I really did on this card was color and assemble.

I colored the polar bear using my watercolor crayons and blender pen. The scarf was colored using a Real Red marker.

I stamped the Real Red card stock using the small snowflake stamp from SU's Snowflakes stamp set and white craft ink. My sentiment is from SU's Great Greetings stamp set.

I added three small bits of ribbon on the left side of my image. My ribbon is from Offray.


I'm not that crazy about my last card that I made. Again, this was a stamped image that I received from a swap that I was signed up for.

I'm not quite sure who makes this stamp. I did see it on splitcoast, so I'll have to check it out and update my blog post. *Edited to add* I just found out who makes this stamp, it's a Stampendous image.

Again, I just colored and assembled my card. The coloring was done with SU markers and I added some white dots and stripes on the presents using my white gel pen.

I also added some gold brads over the red ribbon and I added one real red brad in the center of the ornament bow (I really do not like the brad that I placed there, but I can't fix it now).

September 21, 2009

Here's my card for today's Clean & Simple challenge! Today's challenge is a sketch challenge; two of my favorite challenges, CAS and sketch! This is the card for which we were to follow the sketch.

I decided that I'd better get going on my Halloween cards. I don't send out that many Halloween cards, but I do make a few each year. I didn't do very much stamping on this card, but over all I'm happy with the way it turned out.

I went to my local Target the other day and I found some really great pattern paper in the dollar spot. Good thing I bought the Halloween packs of paper because; I couldn't find a ghost stamp so I ended up cutting out the ghost from a piece of the pattern paper. The smaller horizontal pattern paper is from the same pack. Not too bad for $1, right?

I cut the letters BOO using my Cricut and the Happy Halloween sentiment is from SU's A Haunting We Will Go stamp set. The eyelets that I added in each corner are from SU. I don't use eyelets very often and I should, I kind of like they way they look. I'm hoping to have some time later in the week to make another sketch card, I just love this sketch! Thanks so much for looking!

September 20, 2009

Hi everyone! Well, it's another beautiful day here. The sun is shining and it's nice and cool, I just wish that I felt better so that I could enjoy it. My daughter was sick with a cold last week and her doctor said that it was highly contagious and that it is likely that everyone in the house will get it; and so far the baby is the only one who hasn't got it (thank goodness).

Today's featured stamper is tankgrl, congrats Heather! I chose to case this card from her gallery. I've always wanted to try and make one of these cards and her card gave me the perfect start. The things I changed on my card are: I used a different stamp set, different ribbon, my sponged background is a bit different, and slightly different colors of blue.

I made a mask by cutting a large rectangle using my Coluzzle template. Then I took the mask and placed it over my card and I began sponging using Bashful Blue ink. The rest was pretty easy. I just started stamping my snowflakes using Bashful Blue, Brocade Blue, and Night of Navy ink (the Night of Navy ink was stamped off onto a piece of scrap paper first).

I added some bling gem stones to the center of the larger snowflakes. I tied my ribbon with some SU silver cording. Then I took the ends of the cording and I tied them together in the center of the knot in my ribbon. I'm still deciding if I like the way my ribbon treatment turned out. For some reason my ribbon looks a lot darker in my picture than it really is. Have a great day and thanks for stopping by. I'm off to make my card for tomorrow's CAS challenge.

September 18, 2009

Happy Friday everyone! I'm looking forward to a nice relaxing weekend. I'm just planning on doing some house cleaning and laundry, but I feel a cold coming on.

This is my card for today's limited supply challenge. For today's challenge we were to create a card using 'spooky' colors. I was shopping the other day and I found some great items in the dollar spot at my local Target store. As soon as I found this paper I thought it would be perfect for Halloween. The pumpkin stamp is from SU's A Haunting We Will Go stamp set.

I just stamped the pumpkins and colored them using my SU markers. I then added some dots along the edges of my main image to match the black dots that are in the pattern paper. I decided not to add a sentiment on the front of my card. I'll stamp Happy Halloween inside my card. My ribbon is from Offray.

Thanks so much for stopping by and have a wonderful day. I'm off to get some much needed rest.

September 17, 2009

Currently I am hosting a Clean & Simple Christmas card swap. Now that the kiddos are back in school I have some more free time and I decided to host another swap. If anyone is intersted in joining us I'll post the link here. We've been playing some games and I've given away a few prizes already. Everyone is welcome to join and you can use any stamps you would like, just as long as your card has a Christams or Winter theme and it is a CAS card. I've hosted two other CAS card swaps and they were both a great success!




And speaking of my CAS Christmas card swap, here is one of the cards that I've made for my swap.

I decided to make my own decorative paper and being that my cards are for Christmas I used red and green ink. I stamped repeatedly using the two smaller snowflakes stamps from SU's Snow Swirled.

When stamping your cardstock for making your own decorative paper you will want to make sure that you stamp in every little space. It might look very busy at first, but when you cut it up into smaller pieces you will see that it isn't so busy after all.

The first picture shows what my sheet of cardstock looked like once I was finished stampin it and before I cut it. Sometimes this is reffered to as a OSW, or a one sheet wonder cards/technique.

The second picture is of my completed card. The sentiment is layered on Real Red card stock and my ribbon is from Offray.
Thanks so much for looking!

September 16, 2009

Happy Wednesday to you all! Well, it's the middle of the week and another beautiful day here in Pennsylvania! I just love this kind of weather. It's not too hot or too cold and soon our yard work duties will slow down. We have to take care of my husband's grandmother's yard as well as ours and with the addition of our baby girl this year, this summer has been very hectic. Fall is my very favorite time of year. I love being outside with the kids raking leaves. I'll have to post some leaf pictures in a few weeks.

Here's my card for today's sketch challenge. As soon as I saw the sketch I knew exactly which stamp set that I wanted to use. This image (and sentiment) is from SU's Essence of Love stamp set. When I first saw this stamp set I thought, UGH! is that ugly, but once I got it and I started playing around with it, it quickly became one of my favorites. That just teaches me not to judge a stamp by the image.....LOL Okay bad pun, but you know what I mean, I hope.

I used my SU markers to color the stamp and then stamped it onto my card stock. It took me a little while to color the image, and I had to 'huff' the image very well before stamping it. You should see my husband shake his head at me when I'm huffing...LOL He thinks I'm nuts, but it really does make a huge difference when stamping.

That's about it for my card, it's pretty straight forward. I followed the sketch for my layout and as for my color choices, well the color wheel made me do it! I had no idea what colors to use and I got out my trusty old color wheel. See I knew I bought that for a reason!

Lastly, I added some glitter onto the flowers and I stamped and cut out the butterfly image and added that to my card. Thanks so much for looking and have a wonderful day!